Mexico City, May 25 (EFE).- Federal Police officers did not execute any of the gunmen involved in a shootout last week in the western Mexican state of Michoacan that left 42 suspected criminals and a law enforcement agent dead, officials said Monday.
"There was not even one execution, Federal Police chief Enrique Galindo said, adding that three suspects were under arrest.
Two Federal Police officers were wounded in the shootout Friday morning at a ranch in Tinaja de Vargas, a community outside the city of Tanhuato.
The killings were not in retaliation for the shootdown of a military helicopter by the Jalisco Nueva Generacion drug cartel earlier this month, Galindo told Radio Formula.
The Jalisco Nueva Generacion cartel has been involved in a series of attacks in recent months, with the biggest occurring on May 1, when gunmen shot down a military helicopter, killing nine people.
The gunmen did not hesitate to open fire on the officers, who followed Federal Police procedures in the operation, Galindo said.
Analysts have questioned the high death toll among the gunmen in light of the June 30, 2014, killings of 22 civilians by army troops in Tlatlaya, a city in Mexico state, which surrounds the Federal District and forms part of the Mexico City metropolitan area.
The army initially claimed that 22 suspected members of a kidnapping gang had died in a shootout, but an eyewitness told investigators that only one person died in the incident and the rest had been questioned and killed.
The latest shootout started when officers arrived at the ranch to investigate reports that a gang had occupied the property, National Security Commissioner Monte Alejandro Rubido said last week.
Three suspects were arrested in connection with the shootout, Rubido said.
The gunmen belonged to the Jalisco Nueva Generacion drug cartel, which controls drug trafficking in the western state of Jalisco, officials said.
